If you stop looking at this strip head on and just step back and take a walk around it there are some things you notice.

When you ignore the action itself and focus on the motive behind it you realize that in a very endearing sort of way Sleaze is actually trying to help Slick, his counter-part.

Slick is feeling depressed, worthless, etc., Sleaze not willing to accept that does the only thing he's capable of to try and make himself and Slick feel better.

The method may be wrong based on our moral compass (and whose to say our moral compass is even correct considering our base instinctual elements, the gift we got from God, demand that we place ourselves above others for a variety of reasons, even feminists are bound to that nature when they try to put themselves above men) but the thought is there. Sleaze doesn't have a lot of options at his disposal.

Of course you can look at it from another angle and just say that Sleaze was doing it for himself, not Slick, but that's the joy of this type of interpretation. It's really up to us the reader to choose how we want to read into it.

I didn't remember the one where he first put his heart in a safe either. It's been a while since I obsessively re-read everything in the archives. Sometimes I lie awake at night and worry that I'm not obsessive enough.

Vancore wrote:

Also, slick just turned into a vampire (No reflection).

No, you can see that the bedspread in the mirror isn't being held up to pillow level (as Slick is holding his up). Devil Slick hasn't gotten back to bed yet, despite the fact that he himself is Slick, or at least occupies Slick's body.

This is only one of the reasons that the Devil Slick sequences are among my least favorite recurring themes, the eternal WTH factor. I prefer for a comic strip to at least usually make sense within its own context/universe, and these sequences don't. IMHO.

Kcils, not necessarily Slick. "Vampire" is a pretty apt term for someone who needs to feed off the suffering of others.

I actually find this strip heartening! First, it shows that, on at least some level, Slick is beginning to "get it;" his conscience pains him, not just once, but for two separate acts in which his actions have caused hurt to others.

Second, it shows that it's not just his selfishness that lets him see the hurt he can cause. Sure, the first hurt he caused was to 'Nique, and so, when she walks away, it is something personal to Slick--someone he personally cares about who may be walking out of his life. But, the second time, it's "just" a nameless devil girl--no-one he knows about or particularly cares about. Someone, in fact, whom blind dogma would claim deserves the torment being heaped upon her. Yet Slick awakens, distressed by her suffering.

Finally, there's one other tidbit: Monique's expression as she walks away. It's not anger; it's sorrow. That's not to say that I'm happy that she's sad! But, it tells me that her walking away is not just an impulse, and that Slick sees that. Anger's easy to deal with: just let the angry person have space and time to cool down; chances are good that she'll regret acting on an angry impulse, and that opens a door for reconciliation all by itself. Sorrow, though, is harder. There must come change--real, demonstrable change--before someone who is hurt will be willing to open the door, again, to the possibility of further hurt.

And I think Slick might just be beginning to understand what that all adds up to: his path to happiness isn't the easy one he'd hoped for. It never really was._________________I am only a somewhat arbitrary sequence of raised and lowered voltages to which your mind insists upon assigning meaning

The method may be wrong based on our moral compass (and whose to say our moral compass is even correct considering our base instinctual elements, the gift we got from God, demand that we place ourselves above others for a variety of reasons, even feminists are bound to that nature when they try to put themselves above men) but the thought is there. Sleaze doesn't have a lot of options at his disposal.

I'll argue how much any soidissant god has to do with the matter with you some other day. Maybe.

One funny thing about morality, though, is that while it's seldom inclusive of all right, or exclusive of all wrong, it can give one a very clear indication of specific wrongs one might enact. And if one is causing harm to another that one can plainly see, then all but the most pathological moral compasses will point firmly to the wrong about such action. Options or no, it's plainly evident that taking ones own insecurities and feelings of inferiority out on another is emphatically wrong. Kcils may not have a lot of other choices open to him, but the one he did choose is wrongful and is not something that he needed to choose to do._________________I am only a somewhat arbitrary sequence of raised and lowered voltages to which your mind insists upon assigning meaning

Well, Sleaze is supposed to be Slick's dark side. Of course he's bound to make wrong choices and be evil overall.
I wonder how he's going to deal with Sleaze though. There doesn't seem to be an exorcist in Sinfestia. And God is childish and unlikely to help.

No, you can see that the bedspread in the mirror isn't being held up to pillow level (as Slick is holding his up). Devil Slick hasn't gotten back to bed yet, despite the fact that he himself is Slick, or at least occupies Slick's body.

Point, Mirror world is kind of tricky to figure out sometimes.

If there are stages to getting over something, I'd say this one is Anger.

The Keebler Elf stages of grieving?_________________"Worse comes to worst, my people come first, but my tribe lives on every country on earth. Iíll do anything to protect them from hurt, the human race is what I serve." - Baba Brinkman

...What should be the fanname? I personally like Kcils but lots of people seem to be using Sleaze. For some reason the difference annoys me more than Lime/Fern. Should we vote this thing?_________________Welcome to Sinfest, the only place with a 46 pages long thread about sentient toasters

Vote?!? On the Sinfest forums?! Where's the anarchy in that? I say we settle the issue via that time-honored tradition of a pie fight!!

Kcils! :hurls a lattice-top cinnamon-apple pie in Leohan's direction:_________________I am only a somewhat arbitrary sequence of raised and lowered voltages to which your mind insists upon assigning meaning

As for the comic, does Kcils have the ability to transfer emotions to others or can he discover how someone feels? I find this interesting to know if he's projecting his feelings onto the stripper or that the stripper does feel sad and lonely._________________www.cobrasphinx.nl

Last edited by Yinello on Sun Mar 10, 2013 3:18 pm; edited 1 time in total

backward names are fucking stupid so i rly don't like kcils as a name and sleaze is possibly more likely as a name for him since it was actually used in the comic itself and it's the tag used for him on the archives

as for harlimefernquin. fern sounds stupid. lime sounds stupid, but tat uses that as a tag for her on the archives so it's most likely. harlequin isn't even really likely in the least but i like it.